Summarize cause and effect analysis of this passage: Descriptive statistics were used to examine the distribution of study variables by group. Categorical variables were summarized using frequencies and percentages, while continuous variables were summarized by means and standard deviations. Groups were compared for equivalence in baseline characteristics after normality was verified using Chi-square for categorical data and independent two-sample t-test or the Wilcoxon rank-sum test for continuous data. A paired t-test was used to examine group differences between study measures at baseline and 12 weeks. To compare changes in systolic and diastolic BP, HRQoL, and scores on other study measures between the intervention and the control groups, a repeated measures linear model with first-order autoregressive covariance structure with SAS Proc Mixed was used to assess mean differences across three points over a 3-month period. Time (baseline, 8 weeks, and 12-week follow-up) served as the level of responses for the within-subjects factor, while the study group (intervention vs control) served as the between-subjects factor to examine the interaction of time x group.50 All statistical analysis was performed using SAS 14.1 software (Cary, NC), and p-values <0.05 were considered statistically significant